Personality and performance in adolescents

Transcription

1 Available online at ScienceDirect Procedia - Social and Behavioral Sciences 180 ( 2015 ) The 6th International Conference Edu World 2014 Education Facing Contemporary World Issues, 7th - 9th November 2014 Personality and performance in adolescents Ticusan Marilena* University of Spiru Haret, Brasov, Romania Abstract Along the teaching process, one of the variables pertaining to student's personality structure and which interferes between the external influences and expected behavioural responses is the self-image a variable dimension of personality. However, situations may occur where the self image does not tally with the reality, either for the purposes of over or sub- dimensioning. In the first case, the student has a much better opinion about its own capabilities, skills, personality traits, which means that he over-values himself. The structure of the self-image at adolescents among other dimensions presents the school self-image. It can be distorted either in the positive sense or in the negative one and can prove counterproductive regarding schoolwork The The Authors. Authors. Published Published by by Elsevier Elsevier Ltd. Ltd. This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license ( Peer-review under responsibility of The Association Education for tomorrow / [Asociatia Educatie pentru maine ]. Peer-review under responsibility of The Association Education for tomorrow / [Asociatia Educatie pentru maine ]. Keywords: Performance, self image, problematic situation; 1. Introduction In a world of search and efforts for a better life, the reference to a truly effective personality ceases to be a matter of evanescent and perishable conjecture, becoming instead an issue of maximum interest. Within the education process, one of the variables related to the student's personality structure and which interposes between external shaping influences and expected behavioral responses is the self-image, a variable dimension of personality. This is represented by the student s image of self: how smart, how skilled, how thorough, how friendly and sociable, how informed is the student in various cultural and artistic or technical-scientific fields, etc. This image is consistent with the features and actual skills or capabilities of personality. In this situation the student is fully aware of his/her own possibilities in terms of intellect or skills, of his/her psycho-moral and psycho- * Corresponding author.. address: marilenatic_bv@yahoo.com The Authors. Published by Elsevier Ltd. This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license ( Peer-review under responsibility of The Association Education for tomorrow / [Asociatia Educatie pentru maine ]. doi: /j.sbspro

2 Ticusan Marilena / Procedia - Social and Behavioral Sciences 180 ( 2015 ) behavioral features and attributes. Self-image, rests at the foundation of our entire personality. In relation to it, our experiences tend to come true and to reinforce our own image, leading towards a vicious cycle. All the actions and our feelings are in accordance with our personal image. We will act according to the person we think we are. We simply cannot act otherwise, regardless of our free will. The person who considers himself as "looser" will have little chance of success, no matter how much would he strive to become familiar with success and as many chances would occur. The one who sees himself as "unlucky" will act in such a way as to show that he is indeed victim of "bad luck". 2. Study data In order for the man to be versatile and efficient, he must be formed as such early, and helped to maintain the abilities he possess at high rates of operation. In a world of searches and strives toward improvement, reference to a truly effective personality, ceases to be a problem of conjuncture, fleeting and perishable, becoming, on the contrary, one of maximal interest. However, situations may arise where self-image is not consistent with reality, either in terms of oversizing or of undersizing it. In the first case, the student has a much better opinion about his/her own abilities, skills, personality traits, which means that the student overstates or overestimates himself/herself. Thus, a student may think he/she owns great mathematical, resolution skills, though, in reality, he/she incurs difficulties in solving easier problematic situations. In the second case, the student s self-image is adverse or clearly unfavorable. The student is not at all aware of possessing certain skills and aptitudes, certain personality traits, having no self -confidence. But often there is consistency between what we want to be and what we think we are at a certain time. Some psychologists believe that this is an inconsistency with what we actually are. This is the issue of self-image that the individual forms throughout his/her life. The aim of the investigation carried was to identify the dynamics of self-image in relation to school performance of teenagers, to capture its features and to check the diagnostic value of the school self-image assessment tool. This research is based on the hypothesis that school performances of teenagers are mediated by self-image. The concerns that the teenagers are facing are focused on acquiring a status within the peer group and on behaviors that place the teenager in a favorable light. Inconsistencies occurring in the structure of self-image actually refer to the conflict between the current Ego and the ideal Ego, conflict that can lead to frustration, stress and low self-esteem. For some people this conflict might seem overwhelming and could lead to depression, for others such conflict represents the method to mobilize the necessary resources to achieve the ideals they set. The aim of the investigation carried was to identify the dynamics of self-image in relation to school performance of teenagers, to capture its features and to check the diagnostic value of the school self-image assessment tool. This research is based on the hypothesis that school performances of teenagers are mediated by self-image. The concerns that the teenagers are facing are focused on acquiring a status within the peer group and on behaviors that place the teenager in a favorable light. Each carries with himself/herself a self-image and an image on the duties in life. A life line and a law on motion which dominates the individual without him/her realizing it (Allport, G., 1991). The law on motion originates from the narrow space of childhood and develops according to an automated option to use freely the native forces and impressions from the outside world. Self-esteem largely involves the expression of auto-evaluation and is similar to the respect that each one has to himself. Allport set out two patterns who emerge from the development of self-awareness that influence the functioning and structuring at the personality of inferiority, the latter being in close relationship to self-esteem. Feelings of inferiority involve perceptions of impairments due to physical weakness, unpleasant physical appearance, sexual impotence or social inadequacy (e.g., poverty). Regarding this point the conception of Allport is close to that of Adler. Inferiority is a problem of self-image holding up to others expectations. He describes the mechanisms used to cope inferiority. Compensation, overcompensating, autistic thinking, rationalization are used for low self-esteem that accompanies the feeling of inferiority. Many self-images, very different in their multiplicity, may oppose often to reality and social certainties. Erroneous self-images of some persons and the life problems encountered, sooner or later, come into firm opposition

3 1688 Ticusan Marilena / Procedia - Social and Behavioral Sciences 180 ( 2015 ) with reality, which requires solutions in terms of social communication. What happens in case of such an opposition can be compared to a shock effect. When self-image is consistent with reality, the student has great chances to optimally integrate in the system of requirements at school or in the interpersonal relationship system. But when self-image is not consistent with reality, either in terms of its overvaluation or undervaluation, integration difficulties become frequent. For those who overvalue themselves conflict states appear between the expected outcomes or performances, based on their greatly increased confidence in their own possibilities and the actual, concrete, observable and objectively measurable outcomes or performances. For those who undervalue and underestimate themselves, the commitment and involvement in various forms of activity is performed with a certain lack of confidence and a certain fear of lack of success, of failure, although the actual outcomes or performances achieved prove the contrary. There are cases where students with low intellectual level achieve high academic performances and students with high intellectual level who obtain poor academic performances. In this relationship a number of non-intellectual factors are involved, including self-image, having stimulating or suppressing role in obtaining performance. Self-knowledge and self-image are at the heart of human problems, with many implications for education and self-education, for development and socio-professional and moral integration of personality. The level of self-image strongly affects performance in all activities, the causal circularity mechanisms operating here being particularly striking: those with high self-esteem have more confidence, are mobilizing more, and do better, which reinforces their good self-image. Those with low self-esteem increase the risk of failures, inducing an even more gloomy view of oneself. Once this vicious circle installs it will be very difficult to remove it. It was found in time that those with high self-esteem interpret differently their success, resorting to a broad range of assignments and behave much more differently than those with a low self-image with limited and predictable self-assignments. One of the greatest adventures of our lives is self-knowledge. It is a tragedy that some people spend their whole lives without a clear target, dabbled into frustration, because they don t know anything about themselves or about how they should address the problems, many of which being created by the environment they live in. Undoubtedly, self-mage has a power so great that its impact on the human being is overwhelming, being able to influence both success and failure. There are people who emphasize their negative aspects and never succeed to be fulfilled, to highlight the qualities they possess and to use their full human potential. Personal image is real, even if we cannot touch, feel or see it. Failure and success are also real. The man reaches a certain self-image not only by means of self-esteem but also through interpersonal relationships, by successive comparing with images others form about the person and the images the person forms of himself/herself. Precisely by means of opinions and assessments of others, the human being begins to refer to himself/herself somewhat objectively and to take a systemic action of self-knowledge. Most often a person behaves not that much according to his/her actual personality traits, but rather according to those he/she believes to possess or those that are desired and expected by others. Thus, a student who believes himself/herself to be intelligent and that others feel the same way about him/her, will endeavor to behave as such, even though his/her intelligence level is average. Also, a person is valued and judged by the images that others have about that person. (Zlate M., 2002) There is also a realistic self-image that is flexible and dynamic, changing together with the evolution of the individual but being also a goal toward which we strive, reflecting the aspirations of the individual and guiding it. In contrast, neurotic self-image is static and inflexible one, a fixed idea, not a guiding impulse, a hindrance that requires rigid conformity. Self-image is an integrator and organizer element of psychic life of the individual, with a major role in the choice of values and goals, it is the core of the personality, defining element of status and social role. Self-love depends largely on the love that we received from our family when we were children. Self-esteem deficiencies that originate at this level are undoubtedly the most difficult to compensate. They are found in what psychiatrists call personality disorder and in those subjects whose way of being with others push them towards conflict or failure.

4 Ticusan Marilena / Procedia - Social and Behavioral Sciences 180 ( 2015 ) We own this idea about ourselves to our family environment, especially to projects that parents do for their children. In some cases the child is burdened unconsciously by his/her parents to fulfill what they want or what they could not achieve themselves and consider that they must impose on their own children. When parents themselves have a high self-esteem are more emotionally stable, more confident in their own forces, less coercive, they provide constant support and encourage, lay down a balance between child protection and autonomy, have a relationship compatible with the children and are models of high esteem for the latter. Parental affection constitutes an important source of self-esteem. The student adapts himself to each situation at school, together with the whole personality. However, the involvement of various personality components varies from one situation to another. Failure in a task can trigger the occurrence of inhibiting factors which can affect student's adaptation to the requirements of school activities. Thus, the student who records failure after failure, regardless of fundamental causes of it, do not develop a sense of safety, confidence in himself necessary to meet and cope new situations. In these circumstances the school situation becomes stressful and the student may react in a number of ways depending on tolerance to frustration, need of self-accomplishment, self-knowledge, etc. Thus, the student undertakes, when he has the possibility to choose, either tasks whose probability of accomplishment is high, or in very difficult tasks, whose failure can be explained easily by the difficulty of their objective. He seeks therefore, those tasks whose predicted probability of success or failure is medium. It can be underlined, the exaggerated tendency to avoid failure, which can inhibit student involvement in different tasks, leading eventually to failure. People who require increased assimilation tend to have an overdimensioned image about their ability. They shall fix provocative purposes which enables them to improve their skills. As long as the skills they possess are improved, this means that their ability increases. Of all ages and stages of human life, the adolescence generates the most views and discussions. All disputes related to this topic originate from the age peculiarities, of the specific position that the teenager has in the society undergoing a fast and chaotic metamorphosis, society to whose changes the teenager is forced to adapt. Adolescence is the period of profound change, unique in the history of the individual. Reaching this stage emphasizes conscious experience of multiple changes and transformations that are characteristic for this period. Adolescence remains remembered as a transition from somehow inner existence, childhood characteristics, to a particular openness to the world and the universe, to understanding their own place among others, the meaning of life and personal effort to become adult. Through the qualitative developments that occur, through maturity on all levels, the adolescent experiences rapidly evolving of concerns for self-discovery, optimization of methods and results of self-discovery, selfdefinition, the objectification of the self-image and ultimately progress into the structure of a system of attitudes toward themselves with multiple implications for the evolution of all other attitudes. Within the education process, one of the variables related to the student's personality structure and which interposes between external shaping influences and expected behavioral responses is the self-image, a variable dimension of personality. This is represented by the student s image of self: how smart, how skilled, how thorough, how friendly and sociable, how informed is the student in various cultural and artistic or technical-scientific fields, etc. This image can be consistent with the features and actual skills or capabilities of personality. In this situation the student is fully aware of his/her own possibilities in terms of intellect or skills, of his/her psycho-moral and psychobehavioral features and attributes. 3. Conclusions When self-image is consistent with reality, the student has great chances to optimally integrate in the system of requirements at school or in the interpersonal relationship system. But when self-image is not consistent with reality, either in terms of its overvaluation or undervaluation, integration difficulties become frequent. For those who overvalue themselves conflict states appear between the expected outcomes or performances, based on their greatly increased confidence in their own possibilities and the actual, concrete, observable and objectively measurable outcomes or performances.

5 1690 Ticusan Marilena / Procedia - Social and Behavioral Sciences 180 ( 2015 ) For those who undervalue and underestimate themselves, the commitment and involvement in various forms of activity is performed with a certain lack of confidence and a certain fear of lack of success, of failure, although the actual outcomes or performances achieved prove the contrary. High self-esteem provides them the opportunity to overcome obstacles and to obtain academic performances. At the same time, we cannot generalize this hypothesis as we consider that academic performances have a major contribution in building self-image. It is highly important for the teachers to show interest in building a self-image as realistic as possible especially by avoiding their negative labelling. Through counseling should be tried the promotion of positive interactions between parent and teenager, leading to an improvement of relations. Central core of this stage is centered on family interventions that will be carried out with the parents and the adolescent. At this stage are introduced ways of effective communication, conflict resolution and an appropriate definition of the role of each family member. A clear discussion of the current crisis experienced by the adolescent and his family, may prove highly efficient in the counseling process. Students with average self-esteem obtain poor and average results in mathematics. This dimension of self-image does not facilitate achieving higher academic performances, but has just a suppressing role (these are students who are oriented towards the group, relations with others, put little value on learning activity that involves exercise and routine; they obtain good results in Romanian language also because the relationship with the teacher is different from the relationship with the mathematics teacher). Another dimension of self-image depending on which school performance both in Romanian language and mathematics is differentiated is the intellectual dimension. The highest percentage of subjects with high and average performances have an average self-image. A low or very high self-image lead to academic performance only in few cases. The explanation may be that the low intellectual dimension of self-image highlights a conservative person that shows little interest in learning activity and a high intellectual dimension is expressed by imaginative behavior which is not appreciated by teachers in traditional learning methods. During adolescence the following problems must be solved, which are also targeted by all counselling activities: -gaining self-confidence; -obtaining a position in the society; -development of social an ethic maturity; -development of positive identification models; -decomposition of confusion of roles and getting a sense of Ego identity; -solving conflicts at early stages of existence based on gained experience; -acquisition of efficient control over own aggression, lack of tolerance to frustration, negative social perception. When working with the family the main objectives shall be the following: -development of entourage capacity to metabolize the reactions of the teenager; - achieve a more functional family structure so as to provide a reference framework that can be internalized by the adolescent; -improve communication within the family; -develop an adequate perception on own personal, family and social functioning patterns; When approaching the adolescent, consideration must be given to the fact that he/she is in a time of crisis consisting of sudden outburst of rebellion, systematically denying his/her previous identity (that of child) and the impetuous desire to gain social status of a mature individual. In terms of economy and intra-psychic dynamics, the adolescent deals with research and denial of identity, placing first aggressiveness in order to obtain this, which is why personality defense mechanisms are mobilized to the maximum. Unconscious conflicts from childhood can contribute to this phenomena. The general hypothesis of the study, based on which we assumed that in obtaining academic performance both intellectual and non-intellectual factors are involved, has been confirmed. In the case of family there must be taken into account the fact that the parent would often prefer to see only behavior dysfunctions without any insight.

6 Ticusan Marilena / Procedia - Social and Behavioral Sciences 180 ( 2015 ) Therefore, the introduction of a change in the behavior and manner of solving problems in the case of adolescent, will often be confronted with family resistance. Although change is desired, it is hardly accepted the fact that this supposes also a change from the parents. The counseling should be carried out simultaneously with his family, as well as with the adolescent. Academic performances of teenagers are not only the result of intellectual level. We found that there are quite a few cases where students with low intellectual level achieved high academic performances and students with high intellectual level who obtain poor academic performances. In this relation a number of non-intellectual factors are involved, including self-image, having stimulating or suppressing role in obtaining performance. The following conclusions can be drawn from this study: - In adolescence self-image is fluctuating, tending to stabilize under the influence of social factors; - In the self-image structure in adolescents, school self-image emerges among other dimensions; - A distorted self-image either in a positive or in a negative way is not efficient for school activity; - The formation in adolescents of a self-image with a level slightly above the real one represents a factor that activates the relation between the intellectual level and school performances - Being factors that structure school self-image, the teachers must avoid the building of a negative self-image in students. By avoiding subjective assessments and negative labelling References Bandura, A., (1986). Social foundations of thought and action: A social cognitive theory. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Pretince Hall. Creţu, T., (1987). Voinţa ca formă superioară de autoreglaj şi rolul ei în învăţare, - Psihologia şcolară, Univ. Bucureşti,. Erikson, E. H., (1950). Childhood and society, New York: Norton. Eysenck, H. J., (1947). Dimensions of personality, Kegal Paul. Golu, M., (1993)..Dinamica personalităţii, Geneze Press, Bucureşti. Minulescu, M., (1996). Chestionarele de personalitate în evaluarea psihologică, Garell Publiching House, Bucureşti. Zlate, M., (1999) Eul şi personaliatea, Trei Press, Bucureşti. Zlate, M., (2000). Fundamentele psihologiei, Pro Humanitas Press, Bucureşti.